Former Wyoming Congresswoman Liz Cheney is not ruling out a run for the White House in the near future and plans to make a final decision in the coming months.
During a recent interview with The Washington Post, the anti-Trump Republican said she’s open to considering a third-party run for President, steering away from the already-crowded Republican primary field.
“Several years ago, I would not have contemplated a third-party run,” Cheney told The Washington Post. But “democracy is at risk” both at home and abroad, she said, citing former President Trump’s “continued grip on the Republican Party.”
“We face threats that could be existential to the United States and we need a candidate who is going to be able to deal with and address and confront all of those challenges,” Cheney told the Post. “That will all be part of my calculation as we go into the early months of 2024.”
In October, Cheney refused to rule out a White House bid. She also said in her recent interview with the Post that she hasn’t ruled out voting for Democrat President Biden if he’s the 2024 nominee.
Cheney, who lost her 2022 midterm re-election bid, has repeatedly pushed against another Trump presidency. On Monday, Cheney issued a grim warning against supporting Trump.
“I hope that there are options and alternatives that reflect the important challenges that we’re facing, and that reflect leadership to meet those challenges, but that choice can never be Donald Trump because a vote for Donald Trump may mean the last election that you ever get to vote in,” she told NBC’s Savannah Guthrie on “Today.”
“And again, I don’t say that lightly, and I think it’s heartbreaking that that’s where we are, but people have to recognize that a vote for Donald Trump is a vote against the Constitution,” she continued.
She also said Monday that “there’s no question” that Trump would refuse to leave the White House at the end of his second four-year term if re-elected.
“He’s already attempted to seize power, and he was stopped, thankfully, and for the good of the nation and the republic,” she said. “But he said he will do it again. He’s expressed no remorse for what he did.”
She added that it’s “a very, very real threat and concern” that Trump will make himself a dictator if he wins the White House.
“I don’t say any of that lightly,” she said. “And frankly, it’s painful for me as someone who you know, has spent their whole life in Republican politics who grew up as Republican to watch what’s happening to my party, and to watch the extent to which Donald Trump himself has, you know, basically determined that that the only thing that matters is him his power, his success.”
